Brax School for Suckers
by surf all day and do the hula
Summary: AU. Set in 5th year. Umbridge finally got what she wanted, Harry Potter had been kicked out of Hogwarts, and given a place at Braxton Institute, where kids go once they've been expelled from their normal schools. Then of course, Voldemort is back..
1. Chapter 1

**Helloooo everyone. So it's been awhile since a popped a story up on here, and this one has been hanging around on my computer for sometime now, so i thought i'd better make something of it.**

**It's set in Harry's fifth year, AU and things have been changed around a bit so it works, but yeah. ENJOY!**

**6 sleeps till christmas!**

* * *

Harry Potter looked at the grey fortress-like building looming up over him. It had a high fence, with black iron bars, already it looked like a prison, for a moment he though perhaps he'd been transported to Azkaban by accident. But it didn't have the same cold, depressing feeling he imagined Azkaban to have, and anyway, Dementors surrounded Azkaban, with real criminals inside, this was, well the future criminals. Although he did feel even more depressed now that he was going to the Braxton Institute was actually sinking in.

From what he'd heard, seventeen percent of Braxton students ended up in Azkaban when they were finished school. And eight percent of students were only at Braxton because they were too young to go to Azkaban.

_Thanks a heap Hermione, _he thought sarcastically about the percentages. But he missed his friends back at Hogwarts, especially Ron and Hermione.

Remus Lupin gave Harry an encouraging smile, 'you know James and Sirius almost got sent here.'

'But they didn't end up here,' Harry said gloomily.

'They had Dumbledore on their side, they didn't have that excuse for a human Umbridge making up rules and proclaiming herself Headmistress either,' Lupin said. 'The second Dumbledore's back, you'll be back at Hogwarts in no time.'

Harry didn't know what to say as he and Lupin where greeted by a woman whose silver hair seemed to have more fly-aways than what was actually gathered into her loose bun at the back of her head, in a funny way she reminded him of Mrs Weasley, she had the same look as when Mrs Weasley was trying to get her household under control.

'Harry Potter I presume?' she said coming over and then noticing his famous lightning shaped scar she smiled. 'And you must be Remus Lupin?'

Remus nodded and shook the woman's hand.

'I'm Professor Nilsson, Headmistress of Braxton Institute,' she held her hand out to Harry which he immediately shook. 'Don't worry about your things, just leave them inside the gates, they'll be taken up to your room as soon as we see which dorm you will be in.'

Harry wondered what the process was for selecting houses here, did they have a magic Sorting Hate like Hogwarts? Or they had to complete a test of some sort. He felt like he was going to be sick. He imagined what kind of kids where here, just like Malfoy. He'd be the odd one out once again.

Professor Nilsson led them inside the grounds of the school, and even though the scenery wasn't too grand on the outside (large rocky cliffs with waves crashing against them) there were large lawns and a fair amount of trees, with tables and benches. They passed a class of younger students who seemed to be having 'fun' with Imps and into the main building. It didn't look as oppressive as it did on the outside – almost nice. Despite the over use of red brick, white edging around the windows and doorways, and green roof tiles, it looked just like most other schools you might find in England, or anywhere else in the world.

'Now,' she said directing them into what Harry guessed was her office. It was a small square room with a large desk, a shelf full of books on one side and pictures of family on the other. 'Let's see, you were expelled from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for picking numerous fights with other students, rudeness towards teachers, not following classroom standards, constantly lying and making up stories, now that seems hardly fair, truancy, wandering around the school after hours, and it says here – organising illegal societies. Harry could you tell me what sort of illegal society was this about?'

Harry looked up at Lupin who nodded to him.

'It was defence training,' he responded.

'What sort of defence?' Professor Nilsson asked.

'Defence Against the Dark Arts – the new teacher this year, she wasn't teaching us properly, it was all theory from an outdated book,' Harry replied angrily. 'And with Voldemort back and all…'

Professor Nilsson raised her eyebrows, 'indeed. Well I hope you find the Defence Against the Dark Arts here up to your standard. So, your school results seem to be fine, you probably could pull yourself up a bit in Potions, I can understand Divination, not many get good results in that class… ah your previous results show that your top marks were in Defence Against the Dark Arts, followed by Charms. And you play Quidditch I understand?'

'Yes Professor, I play Seeker,' Harry said.

'Well,' she said pulling out a large book, 'Rosoff house has been playing without a proper Seeker for some time now; we'll put you in that house. If you follow me now, I'll show you to your room and then we'll get your uniform and timetable sorted out.

'Harry, Braxton Institute has the same rules and code of conduct as most other Wizarding schools would have, we are more lenient and accepting of situations, that's why we accept students who have been expelled from their first school. We give them a second chance. And remember it's not just for students who've been expelled from their schools, a large proportion of our students have been sent here because their families chose to send them here. We offer counselling services if you find you're having trouble with anything at all, or if you wanted we could organise an apprenticeship or internship that you may be interested in. At the moment one of our boys is taking every Thursday to work with Julius Johansson, a well renowned wand maker in the USA.'

Harry nodded taking everything in as he was led into a building that had 'ROSOFF HOUSE' in large white letters. He realised that apart from being a school full of criminals, Braxton was to be very different from Hogwarts.

'This will be your room, you're sharing with Jaden Crowley, he's in fifth year as well and on the Rosoff team, Beater. You have an owl I presume?' she asked.

'Yeah… but she's not here at the moment,' Harry replied knowing that Hedwig would be able to find him.

'The owlery is in that building over there,' she said pointing to what seemed to be an enormous open birdcage over on the other side of the grounds.

Harry nodded.

'Now for a uniform, follow me,' Professor Nilsson said sounding rushed and stressed.

Lupin gave Harry a reassuring smile, 'doesn't seem so bad now does it?'

Harry shook his head miserably, knowing that it might not be bad, but it wasn't Hogwarts.

The uniform shop was a stuffy room that was crammed with all different sized uniforms and two cramped change rooms up the back.

'Try these on,' Professor Nilsson said handing him a pair of grey trousers and a blue shirt.

He took them into the change room and pulled the clothes on slowly and then looking at himself in the mirror. He looked like the student of an ordinary Muggle school. It was only a blue and maroon stripped tie, a hat that looked very much like Dudley's Smeltings' hat, only with a blue and maroon band around it, a blue-grey jumper and a navy-blue blazer for the colder months.

'We considered using cloaks and more traditional uniforms, but every second weekend we take the pupils into London and the younger students are required to wear their uniform, so if they blend in it works for everyone,' Professor Nilsson said to Lupin.

'Oh I agree,' Lupin said nodding. 'Are the students able to go to Diagon Alley?'

'Oh yes, we prefer it if they go there, the bus takes them there, but once again the younger students aren't allowed into Muggle London. Harry being in fifth year though, is allowed into the Muggle city. The students need to learn responsibility, and they need to know that we trust them. But if they misbehave they'll be grounded and not allowed out of school grounds for a certain period of time. Most of the students can be trusted by fourth year.'

'Here, they fit fine,' Harry said coming back out of the change room and handing over the clothes.

'Excellent, now your Quidditch robes,' she said handing him the blue and silver Rosoff robes.

* * *

'You know if you ever want to talk, just write and we can meet up in the Leaky Cauldron, and I can always arrange for you to meet up with Sirius at some point when you have free time,' Lupin said.

'Thanks,' Harry replied.

'You'll be out of here in no time, as soon as Dumbledore's back,' Lupin said. 'And you'll be able to go to the Weasley's for Christmas, I've already asked.'

Harry beamed, 'well there's about a month till Christmas… so I will get to see Ron and Hermione and everyone again.'

'Alright, I best be off, remember if you ever need me…'

'Don't worry, I'll write,' Harry said smiling.

'You'll be okay, you've been through worse,' Lupin smiled. 'Sirius will kill me if I'm back soon to tell him how you are.'

'Say hi to him for me,' Harry said meekly.

'Okay, bye Harry,' Lupin said leaving.

Harry sighed when his old friend disappeared down corridor. He sat down on his bed. He could unpack… there wasn't much of a choice, the time was two o'clock, so there was about an hour till school was out and until he would get to know his new roommate.

He looked at the wall on the opposite side of the room, it was covered with posters of a Quidditch team, and bands, there were photographs of a group of kids Harry's own age.

His room was far more modern than Hogwarts. It had electric lights, individual study desks with their own lamps. It was comfortable, but it didn't have the same character as Hogwarts. There were passwords to get into each house, but secret passageways didn't hide the houses. The school was built less than a hundred years ago and didn't have anywhere near as much history, let alone an interesting history. As far as he knew it was named after some boring wizard who didn't like the way his sons were being treated at Hogwarts, as in being punished for their crimes against the school rules, so he started his own school.

Harry looked up to see a girl with long, kind of messy blonde hair opening the draw underneath his roommate's bed and take out a can of Coke.

'Want one? There a bit warm, but still good,' she asked in her Australian accent. Harry shook his head. 'Hmm… oh you're that new guy right? I'm Alex.'

'Harry,' he said awkwardly.

'Oh right, Harry Potter, we were told about you. I mean, we all know about you, but I have to admit I didn't really know much about you, but everyone else filled me in on everything about you and Voldemort and how you're famous,' Alex said at a hundred miles per hour.

'Uh, okay,' Harry said a little confused as to why she didn't care she was saying Voldemort's name.

'I have a question,' she said. 'Why is everyone here afraid of saying Voldemort's name? I mean it's just a name, seriously.'

'Er –'

'Alex, you're scaring the poor guy,' said a new American voice from the doorway. 'I'm Jaden, and welcome to Brax, the most boring place on the planet.'

'Harry,' he replied.

'Nice to meet you Harry. Help yourself to a Coke, my mum brings me food all the time, she feels sorry for me here,' Jaden said tossing Harry a Coke. 'So, if you don't mind me asking what'd you do to get sent here? Sorry, but you're the guy who defeated You-Know-Who, as if the school would kick you out. Wouldn't they see you as protection?'

'Um, it's kinda a long story,' Harry replied.

'And we have plenty of time seeing as I'm grounded,' Jaden replied.

'Don't worry about him, you don't have to tell us if you don't want too,' Alex said.

'Nah it's alright,' Harry replied. 'It wasn't much really; we just had some crazy woman sent in by the Ministry to keep an eye on things and to teach Defence. She was pure evil and a crap teacher. The next thing we knew she was 'High Inquisitor' and making up all these stupid rules, like having to have clubs and teams registered. Even Quidditch, but the thing was she did that right after me and some friends made up this Defence club thing – to actually teach us stuff seeing as Voldemort's back and all. And then she found out and kicked me out.'

'Wow, that sucks. She expelled you just for that?' Jaden said surprised. 'That's really bad… what'd your Headmaster do? Dumbledore?'

'Jaden, don't tell me you didn't hear that he disappeared recently,' Alex said gaping. 'It was all over the papers.'

'Oh yeah… forgot about that. Ha, bad luck,' Jaden said. 'Mmm,' he began with his mouthful with Coke, 'so do you play Quidditch?'

'Yeah, Seeker,' Harry replied.

'My dad plays pro Quidditch,' Alex said. 'In the NQL, National Quidditch League, he plays for the North Queensland Dragons, and for the Australian International team.'

Behind her Jaden was mimicking her every word, Harry laughed. Alex gave him the evil eye and then turned around and hit Jaden.

'She tells everyone about that,' Jaden said.

'Do not,' Alex retorted.

'Name five people you haven't told,' Jaden said smirking.

Alex thought for a moment before saying, 'I can name thousands… every single Muggle I have ever come across.'

Jaden through a pillow at her, 'that doesn't count. So Harry, what subjects are you taking?'

'Er, Defence, Transfiguration, Charms, History of Magic, Herbology, Care of Magical Creatures and Potions,' Harry replied.

'Ugh, Potions, I hate Potions,' Alex said making a disgusted face.

'That's why she was sent here, she blew up the Potions labs at All Hallows,' Jaden explained before saying in the worst kind of American-trying-to-sound-Australian accent, 'back in Australia.'

'Jaden,' Alex said seriously, 'you're gay.'

'You're just saying that because you know I'm out of your league,' Jaden said just as seriously before quickly adding, 'as in better than you.'

'I did Divination back at Hogwarts, but I was kinda hoping to get out of it here so they left my timetable blank during that class,' Harry said.

'Ooh, do Muggle Studies with me!' Alex exclaimed excitedly. 'It's so fun! And easy, at the moment we're studying the Muggles' interpretation of magic – so all we're doing is watching movies and then talking about them. And we get to do all our essays on the computer, and get to go on the Internet!'

'Don't listen to her,' Jaden said. 'Do Divination again. I do it. It's the biggest bludge, the woman's crazy.'

'Does she predict horrifying deaths to students?' Harry asked.

'Uh no, but she did predict that at the end of this year half the school would be struck down with the plague. Oh, so yeah, she does predict horrifying deaths, well she did this year anyway, but I think she's forgot,' Jaden rambled.

Alex over exaggeratedly mouthed 'why' at him.

A bell rang and a voice sounded out through the dorm 'could all the students in Rosoff and Crowley please go to the dining hall for dinner.'

'Oh good I'm starving,' Jaden said jumping up.

'Is Crowley another house?' Harry asked.

'Yeah, there's us, Rosoff, Crowley, Earls and Linton,' Alex said, 'this school is pretty pov and the dining hall is really small, so we have two separate dinners, one with a different house each term and at two separate times. This term, we go first.'

'Thank god, last year we were on the second dinner for the first two terms. It was horrible,' Jaden shuddered.

'C'mon, you'll get to meet Michael and Daniel now,' Alex said leading the way to the dining hall.

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**Sooo any good? Review and tell me what you think, constructive critiscm welcome. Unless you're american and telling me that spellings off, just think and realise for a second that america spells words differently to the rest of world.**

**Cheerio then**

**xox**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hello all! **

**First of all I'm _so so sorry!_ I know it's been like a month since I put the first chapter up, but you know how it is, school holidays, Christmas, New Years, work... ITS ALL TOO MUCH! haha not really I just take a long time writing chapters.**

**I hope you all had an good Christmas and an awesome New Years Eve.**

**Enjoy!**

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The dining hall was as drab and modern as the rest of the building. The hall was shadowy as three of the ten long, fluorescent lights seemed to be broken, the walls were painted a dull yellow, and about fifteen tables that sat six people were set up in the middle. There was a long cafeteria-style bench at the end where the first few students were lining up to get their dinner.

'Eww,' Alex said looking at the plate of another student as they walked past, 'it's the Brax interpretation of stir-fry.'

Harry looked at the plate, it looked like a normal stir-fry, but he noticed that the majority of the people eating were only eating the noodles and a select few pieces of beef.

Students were coming in from two entrances, the one that Harry, Alex and Jaden had just entered through, and one on the other side of the hall, next to where the food was being served.

'Hey,' a tall boy with black hair said waving at them from across the hall, with a plate of food in his hands.

'Michael, don't yell across the hall,' a teacher snapped in his direction, 'go sit down.'

The three of them headed over to a table where Michael and a blond boy had just sat down.

'Hey, this is Harry,' Jaden said sitting next to the blond boy, 'he was just kicked out of Hogwarts. Harry this is Michael, and Daniel.'

'Hey,' all three of them said in unison.

'So we're just going to get our food now, don't let anyone sit in our seats,' Alex said.

'Sure thing,' Daniel said through a mouthful of food, he was one of the few people in the hall eating everything on the plate. 'Get some cordial too.'

Harry followed Alex and Jaden as they picked up plates and cutlery before choosing from noodles or rice.

'I suggest eating the noodles,' Jaden said as Harry picked up the scoop for the rice, 'it tastes ok when it's half cooked.'

He dropped the rice scoop and then put a heap of noodles on his plate before getting a scoop of vegetables and then the beef. He noticed that Jaden and Alex had avoided the vegetables.

'Is there anything wrong with the, uh, vegetables?' Harry asked suspiciously.

'Oh, not really, it's just that they're half raw,' Alex said taking two pieces of white bread and smothering them with margarine whilst Jaden went over to a fridge and took out a jug of green cordial.

At the table Daniel and Michael told Harry why they were at the school. Michael had always been getting in trouble at home as a kid, terrorising the Muggle kids in the area and so his dad who had simply had enough of all the complaining parents who claimed their children came home with green hair or forked tongues, wrote to Dumbledore saying that his son wouldn't be attending Hogwarts and he sent him straight to Braxton, returning home most weekends.

'I don't know what he was so worried about, I mean, it's not like I would've got in much trouble at Hogwarts anyway,' Michael said shrugging, 'I'd be around other magic kids so I wouldn't need to be pretending all the time.'

'Oh yeah, and being around magic kids keeps you out of trouble,' Jaden said rolling his eyes. He looked over and Harry and said, 'he was suspended last year for hexing this Muggle kid this time we were in London.'

Daniel started laughing, 'that was hilarious.'

'It wasn't funny, you deserved every bit of punishment you got,' Alex said, her eyes flashing angrily.

'Alex come off it, the kid had it coming,' Michael said, 'he was some snotty nosed, rich kid who had too much to say.'

'But stopping him from anything at all? He didn't even do anything to you,' Alex said, 'you started it.'

'God Alex, calm down, we've been through this before,' Michael said, 'I thought we agreed never to talk about it again.'

'Well don't get angry with me, he's the one who brought it up,' Alex replied.

'Ok end of discussion,' Jaden said. 'So Harry, what Quidditch team do you follow?'

Everyone at the table suddenly relaxed. Michael had the most to say about the subject, boasting about how good he was at Keeper, and although he made a few funny jokes, Harry found him annoying and slightly irresponsible, especially with the story about hexing the Muggle boy. He realised he was sounding like Hermione, maybe she was right about _some_ of the students here, but they couldn't be any worse than him.

Desert was the best thing about the school so far, at first Harry was a little disappointed with the bowl of vanilla ice cream, but when he discovered the twenty different topping flavours he would've gone back for seconds, if it had been allowed. Finally they were ushered out of the hall, the trio said goodbye to Michael and Daniel and headed back to their dorm.

'I wish the cooks would pick up their act,' Jaden said irritably, 'the foods been really dodgy lately.'

'Why don't they just use magic and make the food good?' Harry asked.

'Beats me,' Alex said shrugging, 'but as long as we have our good friend Jaden here to supply us with food, I doubt we'll ever go hungry.'

'That's the only reason she's friends with me,' Jaden said to Harry.

'It sure is,' Alex grinned emptying a packet of macaroni cheese into a bowl and turning the dry pasta and orange powder into a hot snack that she wolfed down in under a minute.

'She doesn't even bother asking anymore,' Jaden said. 'Thank god it's Friday tomorrow.'

'What happens on Friday?' Harry asked.

Jaden grinned, 'it's basically a half day. We have four shortened classes in the morning, then after lunch we have activities.'

'Three hours of running around like maniacs,' Alex said. 'We're in groups, and it's supposed to be friendship and trust builders, and apparently the more sport you have in a school the better grades you get, crap like that. But it's all sorts of games, Muggle and magic. Good fun.'

'Do you know which group you're in?' Jaden asked. 'It'd be on your timetable.'

Harry leaned over to his bedside table and pulled the A4 piece of paper off. 'Um, it says group four, B-R-I,' Harry said a little confused.

Alex and Jaden started laughing, 'oh that sucks,' Alex said.

'Why?'

'You got Ridges,' Jaden laughed.

'What's wrong with him?'

Alex and Jaden howled with laughter. 'Oh that's precious,' said Alex.

'Let's just say, well, she, is one of the strangest people ever,' Jaden said.

'She had her index finger bitten off by a monkey,' Alex added.

'And she looks like a man.'

'She gets cross when you steal the pillow off her chair.'

'Like that time she accused me and Daniel of stealing her pen, and she refused to let the class leave until we gave it back to her,' Jaden said laughing.

'Oh the memories,' Alex said shaking her head and wiping back the tears of laughter.

Alex and Jaden told Harry everything there was too know about Braxton for the next half an hour until the same voice from before called out over the speaker for study.

'What's study?' Harry asked.

Jaden rolled his eyes, 'a complete waste of time. We go to the study hall and stay there in absolute silence with teachers patrolling and making sure we don't move unless we have to go to the toilet.'

'So you have to do homework? In silence,' Harry asked knowing that this school wasn't going to be as fun as he first thought.

'Yep,' Alex responded. 'The only way to get out of it is to go to the computer rooms if you do Muggle Studies, like me, or if you have to practice spells.'

'You didn't have study at Hogwarts?' Jaden asked.

'No, but me and my best friend, Ron, never did much work anyway,' Harry said. 'We usually just copied off my other friend, Hermione.'

Alex giggled, 'oh I'm sorry, it's just that Hermione is a really funny name.'

Harry opened his mouth to say something, but the dorm supervisor came in. 'Come on you lot, off to study.'

She was a young woman, large, with shoulder length blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail and an engagement ring on her left hand.

'Hey Macca,' Alex said jumping up off the floor. 'This is Harry, he's the new kid.'

'Hi Harry,' she said looking around at the messy room. 'Why they put you in here with Jaden is beyond me, they're trying to fix up these students. Jaden you'll have to clean your room tonight, before you get any supper.'

'Yes Macca,' Jaden replied rolling his eyes.

'Harry, I'm actually Miss McKenzie, but the students insist on calling me Macca,' she said. 'You won't have any school work to do will you?'

Harry shook his head.

'Well just write a letter, read a book or something,' Miss McKenzie told him. 'Now you lot, off you go.'

'I'll see you guys later, I need to do my Muggle Studies assignment,' Alex said running off behind Miss McKenzie.

'No she doesn't,' Jaden said. 'She just wants to use the computers.'

Harry picked up his bag, it had his quills and books in it, and he looked over and saw Jaden pull out a pencil case and a couple of books. Jaden looked back at him, 'what's that feather for?'

'This?' Harry said holding up his quill.

'Yeah.'

'It's a quill,' Harry said, Jaden looked confused. 'For writing with.'

'Oh,' he replied. 'Why don't you use a pen?'

Harry thought for a moment, that was a really good question. 'I don't know. Everyone uses them at Hogwarts.'

'Hogwarts must be a magical place, mind the pun,' Jaden said in wonderment. 'No study, quills, kids getting expelled for starting clubs…'

Harry punched him in the arm.

'Now you're getting into the spirit of things!' Jaden said happily. 'Let the violence begin!'

* * *

The study hall was just as plain and boring as the dining hall. It was a large room with about fifty desks in it, each desk sat two people and there was a large desk up the front for the teacher in charge with a blackboard behind it. Harry laughed when he saw in block letters across the top of it saying 'AFRICAN AMERICAN BOARD', which as much as they tried, the teachers could simply not rub off.

It was slowly filling up and Harry and Jaden took a desk towards the back of the room.

'So most of the kids here are normal, and the rest are expellees,' Jaden explained. He pointed to a girl with black hair, who looked like she could match Hermione in a battle of the brains competition. 'That's Tia Madrusan, she's possibly one of the smartest kids in our year, but she was kicked out of a school in South America for continually practising her spells on other students,' he said, 'and not just usual hexes, big stuff, that practically destroys your body and brain and stuff like that.'

Harry looked at her, her uniform was perfect, every button done up, not a single crease, even her tie looked like it was ironed. She was talking quickly in Spanish to a younger boy.

'That there is Mike,' Jaden said pointing to a small skinny boy with blond hair. 'He sold all sorts of illegal items, and if you ever want anything,' Jaden said tapping his nose, 'he's the kid to see.'

Mike sitting next to a girl with dyed black and blonde hair, lots of black eye make up and quite a few piercings.

'Emily 'Emo' Hill,' Jaden said. 'Alex is good friends with her; they both came from All Hallows. Emily gets into fights a lot; you might want to stay on her good side. Oh and don't call her Emo unless you're a good friend of hers.'

'Who's he?' Harry asked as a tall boy with messy black hair walked in behind Miss McKenzie.

'Lennox Black, he's in the grade above us,' Jaden said. 'You didn't know him? He was expelled from Hogwarts. Apparently he tried to kill a teacher.'

'He what?' Harry asked. 'I didn't hear about that.'

Jaden looked surprised, 'I guess they tried to shush it up.'

So he was at a school that had students who were murderers, drug dealers, people who liked to attack other people, practice magic on other students and blow up buildings. Well maybe not murderers, but close to it. Harry was beginning to think Hermione had been spot on when she told him her statistics.

'Alright, quiet everyone,' Miss McKenzie called out over the hall. Surprisingly everyone quietened down, Harry had expected mass rebellion, but everyone sat down, whispering to his or her friends and pulled their books out.

'Don't worry,' Jaden said. 'We're not like this every night. It's just if you don't do study on Thursday night, they make you do it instead of activities.'

'That would be bad,' Harry said deciding he would write to Sirius first, then Ron and Hermione.

_Dear – _would it be okay to use Sirius' name? Probably not, he thought, the school wasn't far from the Ministry of Magic.

_Dear Snuffles,_

_Well I'm at Braxton, or as the students call it 'Brax'. It's actually not that bad, I've made some friends here, they seem nice enough, but heaps of the other kids sound sort of crazy, there's this one kid who was expelled from Hogwarts because he apparently tried to kill a teacher. Do you know anything about that? He might even be a relative, his name is Lennox Black. _

_Anyway though, the foods real dodgy and –_

'Who you writing to?' Jaden whispered.

Harry looked over; Jaden had his head buried under a pile of books, his right arm stuck up in the air and his face looking out of the gap between his arm and the table.

'Why are you sitting like that?' Harry asked wondering if his friend was okay upstairs.

'Oh yeah, I'm just sleeping,' Jaden replied. 'Was sleeping… going to sleep… anyways who are you writing to?'

'My, uh, friend,' Harry said.

'You call your friend Snuffles? Is that his real name?' Jaden said sitting up straight looking over at Harry's letter.

'No, it's just what we call him to annoy him, I don't remember how we came across it, back in first year or something,' Harry quickly made up.

'Like how Alex calls Daniel Drool sometimes, cause of this one time in History, he fell asleep and he drooled all over his arm,' Jaden said quite loudly, which unfortunately attracted the attention of Miss McKenzie.

'Jaden move up here next to Lennox,' she said not looking up from her book.

Everyone in the room looked at Jaden who looked horrified and made a cross sign on his chest. Lennox just rolled his eyes and continued on with his work.

'But Macca, I wont talk anymore, I was just telling Harry all about Brax,' Jaden said standing next to his desk.

'Really? Because to me it sounded a lot like you were telling Harry all about Daniel drooling on his arm,' she said pretending to be puzzled as students laughed.

Jaden rolled his eyes, 'yeah, it's an important part of Brax history.'

'Okay then, I'll let Mr Dreson know that you'll be in the library during activities tomorrow researching the history of our school,' Macca said and then everyone laughed at Jaden's misfortune.

'If I go sit next to Lennox can I go to activities?' Jaden asked hopefully.

Miss McKenzie thought for a moment just to get on Jaden's nerves, 'if you can get down there in ten seconds. Nine, eight, seven,' Jaden crammed all his stuff into his bag and sat down on four.

Jaden waved at Harry from his new seat and then turned to say hello to Lennox.

Lennox's reply was inaudible, but from the look on Jaden's face it wasn't a friendly greeting.

When the room had finally calmed down again and returned to its silence, Harry went back to his letter writing, wondering how much longer until study was over.

* * *

**I'm still not entirely happy with it, so it might get changed a bit in the next week or too. And it went longer than I wanted too, there was supposed to be more so that'll just begin the new chapter.**

**Review!**

**Happy New Year **

**xox**


	3. Chapter 3

**Hey all!**

**Eh what can I say? I'm lazy, and I've been moving house. Now I'm in my nice big new one! Hurrah! Also, going against all my moral values, I've decided that I should put effort into school now, considering I'm in grade 11, so only a year to go. I've actually handed assignments in on time! GO ME!**

**Enjoy!**

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Harry woke up remembering the previous day's events; he had arrived at Braxton Institute, he had made friends with Alex, Jaden and their friends Daniel and Michael. The school was completely different to Hogwarts with its dinner times, study times and bedtimes.

At nine they all had supper in the common room of tea, biscuits and hot chocolate (no coffee was offered) and then everyone had to go back to their proper dorm, and Alex was ushered to the girls' side of Rosoff House. Then it was time for showers and lights out was at ten o'clock, but Harry learnt that most of the students didn't go to bed until well after twelve.

Harry found himself darting in and out of rooms, then back in his own room eating with Jaden and Mike, the kid who dealt drugs, and then in some kid called Cameron's room who had a laptop and so they were watching Muggle horror movies until about four o'clock when they all headed back to their respective rooms when Miss McKenzie came in with her torch and threatened to give them extra charges in the morning.

He rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, it was six thirty and Miss McKenzie had just come through and woken them all yelling 'if you're not up by the second time I come around there'll be trouble.'

So Harry got out of bed as Jaden slept on. He changed into his new uniform, which was stiff, and starchy, he looked at his reflection in the mirror on his cupboard door. His hair sticking up in all directions, there were bags under his green eyes and his uniform was askew.

'Alright Jaden, I warned you,' Miss McKenzie said coming in with a bottle of shampoo and pouring it on his bed.

'What the,' Jaden said swearing four letter words.

'Up,' she said taking his doona off him.

'Alright, alright,' he said getting up. 'Morning Harry.'

'Morning,' Harry replied.

'I'll be back in a minute, just going to wash this crap out of my hair,' Jaden said shaking his head. 'Lex will be round soon.'

When Jaden disappeared around the corner Harry picked up his comb trying to figure out how to get his hair to look normal.

'Hey,' Alex said sitting on Jaden's bed. 'Don't, your hair looks hot. Oh you're not supposed to wear your formal uniform today; you have to wear the other one.'

Alex was wearing the school polo, track pants and a pair of red converse.

'Right,' Harry said looking at her awkwardly.

'Hmm? Oh right, don't worry I wont look,' she said turning around. 'Where's Jaden?'

Harry looked over at her she was flicking through a book on Jaden's bedside table.

'Just washing shampoo out of his hair,' Harry shrugged pulling his polo shirt on.

'Huh, well lets go to breakfast, come on,' she said getting up. 'He'll follow.' When they past the bathroom Alex stuck her head in and yelled where they were going.

Breakfast was much more unorganised than dinner. It was on from seven to eight and you could come and go as you wished. Harry found that breakfast was much more appetising than dinner and found himself stacking his plate full of bacon, eggs, toast and sausage.

Alex looked around and saw a table that had two other girls sitting there, one of them was Emily who was wearing the skirt and blouse.

'Emery!' Alex shouted into her friend's ear.

'Hey,' Emily said as Alex sat next to her and Harry on the other side of the table next to the other girl who had brown hair done up in a messy ponytail.

'Harry this is Emily and Beck,' Alex said beginning introductions. 'Emily, Bec, this is Harry.'

'So you're the new kid from Hogwarts,' Emily said looking at him making Harry feel a little worried.

'What did you do to get expelled?' Beck asked, she sounded American and seemed nicer.

'We have this crazy woman from the Ministry working in the school now, making up rules and pronouncing herself High Inquisitor and Headmistress. And she hated me from the start and just kept looking for reasons to kick me out,' Harry said thinking that he summed it up pretty well.

'Mm, it was Umbridge,' Alex said taking a bite of toast.

'And that is?' Emily said looking confused.

'You know that fat woman who always comes in here nitpicking,' Beck said.

'Oh the one that…' Emily said trailing off and shrugging, her black fringe falling in her eyes that were almost a gold colour. 'So Harry, what's Voldemort like?'

Everyone in the nearby vicinity looked at their table and Harry squirmed uncomfortably.

'Emily, you can't ask that!' Beck said in dismay at her, she was biting her nails, which were half covered in chipped nail polish. 'So Harry what classes are you taking?'

Harry began telling her as Jaden turned up and sat at their table, his hair combed up into a Mohawk like style.

'Hey Emily, Alex, Beck,' Jaden said happily eating his bacon and eggs which he had collected on his way in.

Emily rolled her eyes, 'how much hairspray did you use?'

Jaden shrugged, 'I dunno, there's still more in the can if you're so worried your little short bits aren't sticking out enough for you.'

And so breakfast continued with Jaden and Emily trading all sorts of sarcastic hairstyling tips until Beck announced that her little sister would be coming to the school next year.

'Oh my God, not that little shit,' Alex moaned.

'I like that one, she's nice,' Emily said smiling.

'Alex and Emily stayed at my place last Christmas,' Bec explained. 'They wanted a white Christmas and Canada is the best place for white Christmas'.'

'I dunno,' Jaden said with a mouthful of food. 'Hogwarts is up north somewhere isn't Harry?'

'Yeah, in Scotland somewhere, there's a lot of snow there, it's freezing,' Harry said, beginning to tell them all about his Christmas' at Hogwarts.

'Well Christmas here is non-existent,' Alex said. 'You have to go home over the holidays.'

Harry briefly imagined having to spend Christmas with the Dursley's and shuddered, grateful that he would be staying with the Weasley's. He decided he would write to Hermione and Ron tonight.

'C'mon, I wanna go to the computer labs, Sam told me about this website called MySpace, and you can create your own webpage! And you have friends on it, and they comment you, and you have pictures…' Alex began rattling off every single little detail she was told.

She jumped up with her plate and looked around at everyone who where still sitting. 'Well?'

'You know, I still have to do my charge,' Beck said jumping up, Emily closely following.

'Yeah, me too,' Emily said.

Alex looked at Harry and Jaden, and Harry looked at Jaden, figuring that there was probably a reason everyone was so quick to get away.

'Charges,' Jaden said grinning with a mouthful of food.

'I hate you all,' she said glaring at them all as she dropped her plate off at the washing up pile and went back to the dorm to get her bag.

Harry looked to Jaden for an explanation, 'what was that all about?'

'Sam,' Jaden began, 'is Alex's boyfriend; he goes to one of the Muggle schools here in London. He's a complete dick, but she doesn't see it, and she doesn't shut up about him and his English-Muggle 'charm'.'

Harry knew a lot of English Muggles, and they were far from charming.

'He was that guy Michael hexed right?' Harry asked.

'Yeah,' Jaden said. 'He had it coming; don't let Alex prove you otherwise. She's a great girl, but she is extremely naïve.'

* * *

Harry's first class that day was History of Magic, and his first impression was that it was even worse than History of Magic at Hogwarts. His first impression of Mrs Edgerton was that she was a senile old bat who didn't know the difference from right and left, and he had the feeling one of the few differences between her and Professor Binns was that she was alive and he wasn't.

And she obviously didn't know what she was talking about.

'So who's got an answer for question two?' she asked the class.

The entire History of Magic class continued scribbling in their books or with their whispered conversation.

'Are you going to try out for the Quidditch team?' Jaden asked.

'Um, yeah, if I can,' Harry replied wondering why this woman was allowed to teach. She couldn't control the class and she had no idea what she was teaching.

'Who's got an answer for question two?' she asked again.

The class continued to talk; a few people raised their hands, including Beck who was sitting in the row before them.

'Well I reckon I can arrange a try out for you tomorrow afternoon or something, that's when we have training,' Jaden said.

'Sounds good,' Harry replied keeping his eyes towards the front of the class, unsure of whether or not he should be paying attention in class or not.

She continued talking for another few minutes about Celtic witches and what provided evidence of what they did.

'I haven't asked…' Mrs Edgerton scanned the list. 'Jaden Crowley.'

'Yeah?' he asked looking up.

'What is your answer for question five?' she asked looking at him from behind her glasses. She was short, about a head shorter than Emily who was the shortest person in their class; she had her hair in a grey bowl-cut and wore a long floral dress with a matching magenta cape and hat.

'Oh, um,' Jaden flicked through his book finding the page titled 'HOMEWORK'. 'Question five… Where can sources such as these be found? Shit,' the lines under the question were blank, as were every other on the page. 'Um Miss… I left my book in my locker last night, so I couldn't do it.'

Several people around the room snickered.

'Jaden that's the third time, I'm going to have to give you a detention at the end of this lesson,' she said. 'Okay, who else can answer the question?'

'No she won't,' Jaden said to Harry.

'What do you mean?' he replied.

'She always forgets, it's more about the fiftieth time I haven't done my homework,' he said. 'You can get away with anything in this class.'

The next class Harry had was completely different. He had Transfiguration with Alex, Beck, Michael and Daniel, and according to all four of them the teacher; Miss Dougherty was a head case.

'What's wrong with her?' Harry asked as they walked from the noisy corridor to the whispers of all the students.

'She's completely evil,' Michael said. 'The last school she taught at was a Muggle one; I think she's comparing Muggles to us, like behaviours and stuff.'

'Harry, sit next with me and Beck, you don't want to be at their table in her class,' Alex said. 'No offence guys.'

'Eh, none taken,' Daniel shrugged.

'What's wrong with them?' Harry asked.

'Nothing,' Alex replied. 'She just hates them and anyone they associate with in her class, mainly because-'

She didn't finish what she was saying, she fell silent as a large shadow fell across her, and Harry turned around to see the largest woman he had ever seen. She reminded him of a beach ball, with her stripy blue and yellow cardigan, with a bright red skirt.

'Hurry up you lot, get inside,' Miss Dougherty said with a voice that reminded Harry of a chimpanzee.

Alex put her books down on the second row from the back with Harry and Beck on either side of her. Alex then whispered, 'try not to talk to loudly, she hates it, she generally gets along with most students unless you don't do your homework, class work, or speak when she's speaking.'

Harry nodded taking it all, knowing he could manage all that.

'Oh, and don't stare too much outside, she hates it,' Beck whispered. 'She gave me detention for that in third year.'

'She also hates rudeness,' Miss Dougherty's voice came from next to Beck, making her jump a mile.

'Sorry miss,' Beck said, her cheeks reddening.

Miss Dougherty nodded and waddled towards Harry; 'So you're the new boy?' she squinted over her pug-like nose at him.

'Yes miss,' he replied.

'Harry Potter, I believe?'

'Yes miss,' he squirmed in his seat. She was uncomfortably close and smelt like mothballs.

'Well, we all know about you,' she announced loudly so the whole class turned in their direction. 'Shame you ended up here with this lot of dunderheads,' she said waddling back to the front of the room, knocking Alex on the back of the head.

Alex rubbed her head, trying not to cry out.

'Alright, you all did the homework I asked you to do?' she peered around the room from her seat. 'So Daniel Fitzpatrick, what did you write about the transformation of people to other objects?'

And class began.

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**So whether you think its good or a load of crap REVIEW!**

**And now one more thing:**

GO NSW!!! 

**QLD ARE LOSERS AND WILL LOSE!**


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